


Warden's Legacy

by Valshaena



Category: Dragon Age (Video Games)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-02
Updated: 2019-04-02
Packaged: 2020-01-01 03:43:17
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,971
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18327938
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Valshaena/pseuds/Valshaena
Summary: Drabbles possibly more composed back in 2011 may be in no particular order





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Originally Posted on DA and FF.Net back in 2011. May post more if the MC will talk to me again.

Sereda Shiala was a street rat. No one knew where she lived not even her mother and sisters. They didn't need to know. The less they knew the safer they were. Especially if the less knew about them. Grey eyed, brown haired, small for her age and looked even younger. Sereda found a place to stay in the tunnels under the city. Tunnels no one alive remembered were there. She used what her betters threw away. Scavenging and selling what she had found to make her way. It wasn't stealing if it was in the trash. She made enough to pay for her lessons at the monastery where she was more tolerated than accepted. She struggled for that acceptance. Trying to perfect her lessons in not just academia but in the physical arts as well. The monks were physical adepts and the Abbot the grandmaster of them all. Sereda mastered the lessons the monks gave her and managed to pester the Abbot into teaching her. At 15 she was better than he would believe. She was a girl. They are never as good as a boy. Always finding some minute flaw in her forms, her control, her ritual. Her fellow students taunting her ever trying to break her control. When she would leave to go home they would try to follow her, ambush her, pick fights with her. She would try to only do what was necessary to end the encounter, nothing more. She came close to losing it a few times but they always seemed to back down, a touch of fear on their faces.... 

She hated going home. Home meant sleep. Sleep meant dreams, nightmares. They seemed so real. She dreamed of nightmarish manlike creatures, of dragons who could see her through her dreams. That's why she stayed in the darkness as much as possible. Where no one could see she could hear she could sense when someone was close and know to stay still and quiet. She could understand them too... that's what scared her. She knew what they said, where they were, from whence they came. She learned to sleep lightly from a young age. Learned not to cry and whimper and show weakness. That is how she survives. 

Recently a few men have come to observe the students. She heard something about them being Grey Warden but what does she care. They aren't going to make her dreams go away. They won't pay any attention to her. With all the criticism she garners there is no way she would catch their attention. The Grey Warden speaks to the Brothers about the threat of Blight that the darkspawn could come at any time from anywhere. He is brushed off with protests of there being no way the darkspawn could make it into this City. She mutters darkly yet quietly "They haven't seen the nightmares of the deep sewers have they?" Then curses herself for carelessness. Someone could have heard her. For any who has that sensitive hearing that she knows she has she has given away her hiding spot. But surely they couldn't find her still... the sewers are huge and labyrinthine. 

One morning she has just arrived at the monastery after a very rough night. The nightmares had come out of her dreams to haunt her waking hours again. Being still and quiet didn't work. The Dragon said kill those who could see and were not of them. She had to fight. She managed to kill them all but just barely. She managed to get her self cleaned up and all of her belongings packed to move when she realizes she will be late for class. She is careless and takes a more direct path to the monastery than she would normally take thinking "Its not like I am going back there again." She soon has someone following her and they are joined by a few more and a few more. She is fully aware of who is following her and when they first observed her. She didn't live this long without learning to know what all was going on around her. Of all the days though. Surely they could have picked any other day to torment her but no that was weakness talking. Always expect the worst and be pleasantly surprised if it doesn't happen. Always make sure to put in that "IF." When you forget that IF things get worse. There is a fight as usual and she arrives in class disheveled. She is punished for her lack of respect for arriving in such a state and late. She speaks naught in her own defense for she would be punished for fighting no matter that she had not started it. Bad enough she was punished in front of strangers though the Wardens made no sign they observed anything other than the usual classes.

She can't sleep in the same place anymore. Nor does she sleep long. The nightmares find her through her dreams she believes. So she doesn't give them long to pinpoint her. The weapons she has painstakingly collected now have found places on her person where no one will notice (she hopes) Her few other belongings managed to fit into a pack that she hides daily before coming back to the surface. She moves around every night finding a new cave to hide in. Sometimes she stays above ground and manages to find a hayloft to stay in. Her mother is upset that she doesn't come round much anymore. She leaves what money she can with her to help with the bills and leaves while they sleep. She can't afford to draw attention to where her family is. She finds it curious... she can sense these things but she can't sense anyone else. She knows they are there by her other senses but these she just knows they are there without any reason to know... how does she do this? 

A few weeks later the taunting starts as it always does as the other students get into position around the random back courtyard where she had chosen to take her stand. But she is already irritated. She stands there taking it waiting for the first strike. Knowing where this is going and not willing to wait she throws out a few words, pushing buttons goading them into rashness. A few are foolish enough to come at her. Some realize this is not how this is supposed to go. Their prey doesn't normally fight back like this and it is the first morning sun or are her eyes glowing silver. As she takes out the fools the rest melt away disturbed determined to watch and wait for a better time to take out this freak. But they can't leave. Darkspawn have flooded the alleyways! Darkspawn on the surface?!? Why can't they stay in her dreams where they belong? She pulls weapons out of the hidden sheaths in her sleeves and settles into stance. Its hard to fight the fools and the Darkspawn too. One she has to make sure live and the other she has to kill. Minor adjustments to form and their final awareness of the greater threat to their lives relieves her of the need to discern between human and non. She has to move. She is slowly being cornered and these are more than she can take on staying in one spot. The other students are getting the same idea and starting to find a break and become a bit more mobile. "They should have thought of moving earlier as hand to hand is a bit more dangerous to the fighter when going up against these things" she thinks sourly. 

She manages to find a break in the hoopla and starts climbing the walls to make her self a harder target to hit. She is also more out in the open allowing for a wider sweep with her shortsword she pulls out from under her cloak. Every chance she gets at a range shot another goes down with several throwing knives in their head and torso. It also kinda determines her path as she hates to lose her weapons and she always goes to retrieve them. There is another cluster up ahead past a man high wall which she vaults over easily only to skid to a stop. There is another fight ahead and she can sense the two fighters that aren't darkspawn. Puzzled she puts the question aside and sets about aiding these men in the dispatch of the creatures. Without breaking stride they take note of her presence (though with a few more glances than she really thinks necessary) and accept her as on their side integrating her in their stances. She recognizes them from the monastery as the Grey Wardens who were trying to warn the Abbot. 

"We need to have a chat with you later" one says over the din of battle simultaneously stabbing two on either side of him.  
"First there needs to BE a later" she retorts with an irritated slash across the the throat of one of the waking nightmares releasing a spray of black ichor and ki striking another in the chest crunching bones as it flies back in to a wall five paces away.  
A nod is his only response as he quickly finishes off one then the other of the two harassing him. He returns to the business of killing the nightmares gathered in the cul de sac.  
She is about to jump into the fray again herself when she feels tremors in the ground. She pauses. Her trained senses try to home in on where the tremors are coming from. Its coming this way she can tell that much but what it is she has no clue. "Um... something... big... is coming this way." Their puzzled glances turn to alarm as a roar nearly deafens them.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~  
Once it was over he turned around looking for her. Apparently she had gotten separated from them in the fighting once the ogre was dropped. Vicious little thing she was about making sure it stayed down. He shook his head. But now he couldn't even sense her. But he was still some what new to all this... still less than five years. "Joran do you sense anything?" 

He glanced back at him a glance that read what he meant. "No but then again I barely sensed anything when we were almost on top of her that first day we were in the monastery." His brow furrowed. "If I thought it were possible I would say she can control it...but that would be hoping too much." Joran shook his head, straightened. "Lets look around and assess. Make sure there aren't any darkspawn hiding. Perhaps we can check the dead make sure she isn't among them. I still want to know how a child has the taint of a Grey Warden. She is obviously not a ghoul..." His musings trailed off as they both set off in a set pattern looking for what shouldn't be.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When the Gray Wardens finally get a chance to get a really good look at Sereda they are not sure what to make of her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Originally posted on FF.net set approx 25 yrs before Origins. She wouldn't let me name her anything but Sereda.
> 
> This one seemed to only write itself poetically.

She can't be more than twelve or thirteen years old.  
Yet her silvered eyes show an age beyond his own  
She is too young to be a Gray Warden.  
Yet she is obviously not darkspawn for the taint blazing in her.  
And that taint; something about her taint.  
When they first saw her they barely noticed it.  
When they went to find her she had very effectively hidden it.  
When she fights them she causes it to blaze like a beacon for any darkspawn to find.  
Almost as if she is trying to draw them to her  
Or is it away from somewhere?  
Is she actually controlling it?  
Who was this tiny yet stout mouse-haired individual who looked nothing like the family she claimed, the family she buried today.


End file.
